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Investigators with the Virginia State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s Salem Division arrested Larry Scott Hawkins, 52, of Montvale, on Feb. 14 at his residence in Bedford County.

At the request of the Bedford County Sheriff’s Office, the Virginia State Police initiated an investigation into an allegation that Hawkins had used a media device to solicit a 17-year-old female for sexual misconduct.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) regulates the transmission and wholesale sale of electricity and natural gas in interstate commerce and regulates the transportation of oil by pipeline in interstate commerce.
That puts power plants, such as Bedford’s Snowden hydroelectric plant, under its purview. Power plants, like Snowden must be licensed by FERC and periodically relicensed.

Congressman Tom Garrett has officially filed his paperwork with the 5th District Republican Committee and the Virginia State Board of Elections, making him the first and only candidate in the race for the Republican Nomination thus far.

This past Sunday, the House and Senate money committees released their separate versions of our Commonwealth’s biennial budget. I serve on the House Appropriations Committee and chair the Health and Human Resources subcommittee of that body. Many of you may have read the headlines that the House of Delegates is “expanding Medicaid.” Let me address some of the confusion and misinformation on this.

This week, the 2018 General Assembly session passed the halfway mark of the legislative calendar, crossover. For the Senate, it’s been a very productive first half.
Senators submitted 994 bills this session. By the crossover deadline, 469 had been approved and forwarded to the House of Delegates for consideration. That means we killed one-half of the bills before us which is also an important part of legislating.

Liberty put Brookville in a spot the Lady Bees had not often found themselves in this season. The Lady Minutemen completely flustered their opponent. An aggressive defense mixed with fast paced offense held Brookville scoreless for the first five minutes of the game.

The General Assembly is now at the midpoint of this year’s sixty-day session. It’s a good time to take stock of work accomplished during the session’s first thirty days.
To date, the House of Delegates has put forth nearly 1,600 pieces of legislation. This work covers a wide range of issues, from economic development to health care, from transportation to education, and much more.

The 2018 General Assembly has now passed the critical “crossover” deadline when each chamber must finish work on all of its own non-budget bills. Going forward each chamber can now only be consider legislation originating from our friends across the building and I will have begun presenting our bills in House committees and subcommittees. Seventeen of the nineteen bills I introduced were advanced by the Senate and are now being considered by the House of Delegates committee system.